Environmental education (EE) and education for sustainable development (ESD) are asserting their growing role in curricula around the world, yet how deeply embedded are they in the learning systems of the Pacific nations?

John Taylor Gatto’s Weapons of Mass Instruction, now available in paperback, focuses on mechanisms of traditional education that cripple imagination, discourage critical thinking, and create a false view of learning as a byproduct of rote-memorization drills. Gatto’s earlier book, Dumbing Us Down, introduced the now-famous expression of the title into the common vernacular. Weapons of Mass Instruction adds another chilling metaphor to the brief against conventional schooling.